John Flanagan: The Royal Ranger

Ruhl’s right arm went back, then started to come forward. Maddie leapt to Will’s side and shoved him out of the path of the weapon. He fell with a startled cry across the stack of firewood. Maddie’s hand went to her shot pouch, moving with the smooth, automatic precision that came from constant practice. She was loading a ball into the sling when she felt a terrible impact against her right hip—an impact that drove her back several paces, and was followed by a searing burst of agony down her upper leg.

She looked down and saw that Ruhl’s short javelin had transfixed her thigh, just below the hip. She felt a moment of disbelief.

“I’ve been hit,” she said incredulously. She had never expected such a thing to happen. But it had.

The evil, barbed head was buried deep in her thigh and she felt the leg give way under her, unable to bear her weight. Blood was coursing down her leg and she fell, causing more agony as the shaft of the javelin jarred against the ground. Grinding her teeth against the pain, she fought the waves of nausea that threatened to overcome her. Tears streamed from her eyes with the pain and shock and she felt herself slipping away. She couldn’t breathe. The awful trauma of the terrible wound seemed to have paralysed her lungs.

Her vision began to fail, until it seemed she was watching events through a long, narrow tunnel, with darkness on all sides. She saw Ruhl stooping to pick up another flaming brand from the fire. Then he started up the beach towards Will. She tried to call to her mentor, but no sound came. Tried to reach out to him, even though he was metres away and beyond her reach.

And then the world turned red, then black.

And there was nothing any more.

Will lay awkwardly on the stacked firewood. He tried to rise, but the branches shifted and gave way beneath his hand and he floundered awkwardly.

He could see Ruhl approaching. The flaming branch in his hand lit his face with a demonic glow and Will could see the contorted expression, where hate and revenge were mixed in equal proportions. In another minute, he would hurl that flaming branch into the fire and Will would be enveloped in the flames.

He cursed the savage, crippling cramps in his arms and legs that restricted his movement so badly. He tried to rise again and failed once more. But he managed to crawl away a little, so that he was on the edge of the stacked timber. His right hand clawed at the sand as he scrabbled to drag himself clear and it closed over a familiar shape.

It was the hilt of Maddie’s saxe, lying on the sand where she had dropped it minutes before. Clumsily, he reversed the knife so he was holding it by the blade. Ruhl was only metres away, the flames on the brand licking angrily, ready to incinerate Will.

Awkwardly, gritting his teeth against the cramping pain, Will threw the saxe.

As it left his hand, he knew it was the worst throw he had ever made. Impeded by the cramping of his stiff muscles, he flicked it clumsily, without the precise control that he normally would put into such a throw. It struck Ruhl—he was too close for the throw to miss—but it struck him hilt first, hitting him on the forehead above his right eye.

The blow was painful, but in no way lethal. The heavy brass pommel cut his eyebrow and blood trickled down into his eye. Instinctively, Ruhl flinched away, and trod on a branch that had rolled clear of the stacked firewood.

It was an uneven branch, bent and twisted halfway along its length, so that it turned and rolled awkwardly under his foot. He stumbled backwards, then tried to recover, throwing his weight forward.

But, distracted by the blood in his eye, he overcompensated and lost his footing. He found himself falling forward, towards the pile of oil-drenched firewood stacked around the stake. The loosely stacked branches gave way under him as he hit them and at that instant, he realised that he still had the flaming branch in his hand, and that it was underneath him.

There was a second’s pause as he scrabbled for a handhold in the shifting branches. Then the firewood ignited with an explosive WHOOF!

Ruhl screamed as the flames shot up, enveloping him instantly, catching his clothes and hair. He struggled to rise again but the stacked branches collapsed further, defeating his efforts. He tried to scream again but the burning air and flames scorched his throat and lungs and he made a terrible, inhuman grunting noise.

Will, on the far side of the fire, felt the flames licking eagerly towards him. Instinctively, he avoided Ruhl’s mistake of trying to find purchase among the shifting, moving branches. Desperately, he rolled sideways, clear of the flames. As he felt the sand underneath him, he continued to roll, moving farther and farther away. His face was burnt. His eyebrows were singed away and his beard and hair were badly frizzled. But he was clear. And feeling was returning to his arms and legs. Painfully, he dragged himself further away from the fire, his horrified gaze fixed on the twisting, jerking, blackened form in the middle of the flames. He tried to shut out the awful grunting, gagging sounds that were coming from it.

Then, at last, they stopped.

Will pushed himself up to a sitting position, his pain-spasming legs stretched out in front of him. Gradually, the cramps were becoming less and less severe. But he still could only move clumsily. Now that he had time to think, he wondered dully where Maddie had gone. He remembered that she had shoved him aside, out of the path of Ruhl’s javelin. But he hadn’t seen what had become of her. Odd, he thought, that she hadn’t tried to help him escape the fire. He twisted his head, looking around for her.

“Maddie?” he said, his voice no more than a croak. Then he saw the dark figure crumpled on the beach a few metres away.

He shoved himself to his feet, fighting against the suddenly recurring cramps that stabbed his muscles as he moved too quickly, and lurched towards her, a huge, inarticulate cry of pain and rage and sorrow coming from his throat and echoing off the cliff face.

He dropped to his knees and felt his heart stop as he saw the cruel javelin buried in her thigh. Sheets of blood had soaked her clothes, looking black under the moonlight. Her face was deathly white and she had lost an inordinate amount of blood. He knew there was a major artery in the thigh, but he thought it was on the inside, and the blood was seeping out, not pumping and spraying as it would with a severed artery. He shuffled forward on his knees and put his fingers to her throat, feeling for a pulse.

There was none.

Again, he let out that terrible, heart-torn cry of pain and sorrow.

He felt a slight flutter under his questing fingers. Then the pulse began to beat. Faintly, weakly. But there. Maddie was alive and his heart surged with relief.

Then it lurched again, this time from fear. She was alive. But she was badly injured and she had lost a lot of blood. She was still losing it, and he had no medical supplies, no bandages, no way of staunching the flow. He had to remove the javelin from the wound. But he knew that as soon as he did, she would lose blood twice as fast as she was now.

He thought of the medical pack that he carried among his saddle bags and looked up at the cliffs above him.

“I hope you brought the horses, girl,” he said. He let out a piercing whistle.

Ten seconds passed, then he heard an anxious whinny. Looking up, he saw Bumper and Tug peering over the crest of the cliff at him. He lurched to his feet, holding up a hand to stop them coming further.

“Stay,” he ordered. He knew they would never manage that rough, rock-strewn path down. He would have to carry Maddie up to them. His brain began working, planning coherently now. Ruhl had taken his saxe and throwing knife when he was captured and he remembered seeing the slaver toss them down beside the camp fire. He was going to need them. He turned, wincing as cramp hit him again. It seemed that if he moved incautiously, stretched a muscle or turned the wrong way, the cramps would strike without warning. But they were becoming less and less savage the more he kept moving and kept the blood supply flowing back to his muscles. He limped down the beach to the camp fire, trying to ignore the terrible stench of burning flesh that came from the fire round the stake. It was dying down now, and he could see the blackened, deformed shape in the pile of embers. He shook his head and turned away, searching for his knives. He found them and buckled on the belt and scabbard, then limped painfully back up the beach to Maddie.